Saturday

Although the Outlook Festival was three weeks ago now, anyone who went will still hold it vividly in their minds. We’ve been collating our anecdotes and pictures to share with you – hence the delay.

Croatia is a crazy place. Pula, where the festival moved to this year, is littered with ruins showcasing the area’s Roman heritage. There are ruins everywhere. The festival site itself is in an abandoned fort on a peninsular surrounded by the sea. You couldn’t dream of a better setting – especially with the campsite, which is on a beach, only a short walk away.

We arrived five days early and went exploring. These were the glory days when beer at the beach bar was only 10 kunas, couple of days later it was 15, and by Thursday it was 20 – which to be fair is still cheap for half a litre. The fort is inhabited by hippies, wild dogs and even a horse. Unofficial pre-parties took place for the first few days until the crowds got too big and unsafe for the non-secure venue - we found machetes while exploring the tunnels! Our initial reaction was that there were going to be some serious casualties at the festival, but this was not the case.

Our festival properly started with our big friend Barry – on the Bigger Than Barry boat party. We all know that these boys know how to throw a party and it didn’t disappoint. Big up to Matt ‘Pasteman’, Phat Pat, Oneman, Rattus and Klose who all smashed it. The topdeck bounced to the setting sun, and then the boat made its way back to the dock after four hours of madness.

In an attempt to avoid turning this into a running commentary, highlights included:

George Lenton who got the crowd going with the help of many of his own tunes. His Dizzee Rascal booty, which I wasn’t so sure about to start with, particularly stood out on the system.

RackNRuin also used his own artillery to fill the ballroom as you can see from the picture below.

Sub:stance night with the likes of Appleblim and Scuba killing it. However DMZ night was probably our favourite - kicked off by the fantastic Kryptic Minds who followed a heavy set from dBridge. Silkie & Quest finished matters with the perfect balance of bass and melodies.

Beach parties during the day were next level. There’s nothing better than lying in the sun listening to a pumping system. Apparently a ‘No Dubstep’ policy was put in place but this quickly went out the window ‘Are You Ready’ was thundering through the campsite at just gone midday! For us, and many others, Chimpo & Chunky smashed the beach show. Gazaaaaaaaaaa!

Submotion Orchestra in the fading light were incredible. Shivers down the back bizness. Gentleman’s Dub Club put on a hype show as usual – shown below.

Out to all the girl DJs out there. Special mention to Lazell killing it on the beach and in the dungeon...

All in all, the best festival we’ve been to. Bestival might have to look into changing it’s name...

Massive respect to the organisers, the hard work paid off; everything flowed seamlessly from arena to arena. We won’t go into the minor hiccups cos the plus points outnumbered them a hundred fold and I’m sure these will be ironed out for next year. Special thanks to Jack Robinson, Liam Wachs and Mark Salford, and of course all the other people running round on minimal sleep.

For an affordable and easy solution to getting to Outlook festival 2011 you should check out Music Festival Holidays. We organise your festival ticket along with coach travel to the festival and stop-offs for party nights out en route to the event.http://www.musicfestivalholidays.co.uk/Outlook-Festival